Breaking the British State

Vince Mills

In this pamphlet John Foster, the author, is able to show that behind the slogans of Smart Successful Scotland the real economic picture is one the decline of key industries like Oil and Gas and electronics accompanied by poverty and degradation.

He explains what globalisation really means: that monopoly capital has not only neutered the Democracy, Devolution of the parliament but now relies on the EU, the World Bank and WTO to ensure that the World is safe for global capitalism.

He correctly identifies New Labour as the chosen instrument in Britain through which monopoly capital has foisted its dogma on the globe.

As Robert Kuttner in his contribution to On the Edge, (2000) puts it New Labour believes that `There is one true path to the efficient allocation of goods and services. It includes above all, the dismantling of barriers to free commerce and free flows of financial capital.'

This is precisely the politico economic context that the pamphlet describes succinctly.

What is also crucial about the pamphlet is its dismissal of simplistic notions that demanding independence is a short cut to a Socialist Scotland. And here the author not only exposes the economic complexities of that notion but just as importantly, he warns of the political dangers of chauvinism and worse, that can easily accompany nationalist struggles led by the right.

The pamphlet is not only about analysis, it also contains a programme for action, programme based largely on reversing the reactionary inroads made by Thatcherism and Blairism. These demands look both radical and likely to win considerable support across a wide range of groups in Scottish society.

Finally, the pamphlet endorses the strategy of seeking to re-win the Labour Party for radical politics.

It may seem that the task of winning back the Labour Party is an overwhelming one. But ultimately there are only two options if you reject winning back the Labour Party: you can either seek to re-invent the Labour/Trade Union alliance, with no credible argument as to how it is likely to be more successful than the first time round, or you can seek to take socialist ideas directly to the working class without an alliance with the trade union movement.

The author argues that the objective conditions are there for the left to make advances. It serves as an invitation for the Left to re-double its efforts to unseat New Labour and win support for a socially responsible alternative.